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Ravi0:00Hello, welcome to the Motivated Life podcast. In this episode, I'll be speaking with Doug Cunnington. Now, I met Doug a couple months ago at a conference for entrepreneurs. It was a marketing and online marketing conference. And in meeting many of the attendees, I ran into Doug and we ended up talking for quite a while. Now, Doug is interesting for a few reasons. One, he's someone who is actually making money online. He not only helps people make money online, he's actually doing it himself. So that was interesting just to hear his story about what he does and how he does it.
But secondly, what was interesting to me was that prior to him starting his online business, he had a great career. He's a project manager, skilled in project management, and he focuses on IT technology project management, and he's worked for some leading companies for many years. And so I thought that was intriguing how he made the transition from working in a corporate job to not only starting an online business, but also moving from Atlanta to Bozeman, Montana to build and grow his business, but also have a higher quality of life.
So, you know, you can only imagine how strong the pull must have been for him to go back into a corporate job. He actually was laid off. But with his skill, he was very employable and probably could have found jobs in a number of places. and he decided to follow his interest and follow an opportunity, and he's been able to make it work. And so I thought it would be fun for us to have a conversation and talk about what it was like for him to make that leap into starting his own business.
We talk about how he made his first dollar online, and we go into specifically his method of business, which is building sites that are called affiliate sites, where he creates a website focused on a specific product set. He provides information and reviews about those products. And then he links off to Amazon and gets a little commission when people read his content and then buy things through his links to Amazon. So we talk a little bit about how his business works. And also some stories of other people who have, either started side projects or have created full-time incomes building online businesses through affiliate websites.
So if you're contemplating a change from a corporate job or you're just curious about how certain people make money online, I think this will be an intriguing conversation for you. We cover a lot of ground, and I hope you enjoy it. With that, I bring you Doug Cunnington ofnitchSightproject.com. Doug, how's it going?
Doug3:31Great, Ravi. It's an honor to be here speaking with you. Appreciate it. Yeah.
Ravi3:37So have a fun weekend? Yeah, it was
Doug3:40pretty good. You know, my wife and I are in a curling league, so we just started doing that. So it was a great weekend.
Ravi3:48Curling, okay. I guess that's that's that's popular in Montana yeah
Doug3:54and you know funny thing we were actually from like the deep south down in Georgia so we had no business being on you know hockey ice and stuff but yeah people play around here and it's a pretty fun sport yeah
Ravi4:08you know we're gonna I'm definitely curious about what motivated you to you know really redesign your life and move to Montana and start your business. There's a lot of a lot of things we're going to talk about, but would love if you can maybe just share a bit of your background and what you did in the technology space. You had, you know, a great career in tech for many years before really rethinking your life and then starting your own business. So what was your previous career all about?
Doug4:42So for about 10 years, I was a project manager for a software company. I kind of played around in that space and started my career at Accenture doing management consulting, you know, right out of school. I had basically no idea what I was doing. I have a computer engineering degree and I was doing sort of more business process, supply chain things. But in consulting, you kind of, you learn things fast and there's a lot of smart people around to help you. So I eventually got into the project management area and earned my PMP.
about eight years ago and you know from there i sort of took the normal you know the path of trying to get promoted getting into management and the you know the typical route that you're supposed to take
Ravi5:34so you had a promising career and then then you decided to shake things up a bit so what are you up to right now and then we'll talk a bit about what led you from point a to point be so sure you're in bosman what do you do
Doug5:50so i this is a tough question sometimes so i say i'm an internet marketer and i do basically focus on amazon affiliate marketing i also have an online course that teaches people how to do that so there are you know two main areas but essentially i work for myself doing internet marketing and with two different flavors
Ravi6:13so what prompted you to go from what most people think is a very good paying career you worked at some great companies to doing your own thing what was what motivated you to make that transition well
Doug6:29they did make it easy on me by laying me off a couple years ago so it took a little of the decision making out of it however you know that was two years ago and four years ago I actually learned about the internet marketing space. I actually had no idea that people were out there making, you know, full-time income. A lot of times more than they were making in their, you know, in their good jobs. And it was via smart passive income with Pat Flynn. Great, great guy.
And I found his podcast just randomly one day. I wasn't into entrepreneurship or startups or any sort of thing like that. and I was just exposed to this whole other world and everything was new and exciting and I started, you know, building some of these, what people call, like, niche sites. So they're sort of, you know, smaller sites where you can, you know, maybe have an info product that you sell or work with affiliates to sell their products. But that's sort of how I got my start and transitioned.
And the thing is, like I mentioned, I got laid off two years. ago and that actually made it much easier because it is so scary to leave a high-paying job, you know, one where externally everything looks great. It looks like a great job. People think you're doing well, but, you know, it's not satisfying. Maybe you can't manage your time how you want to. Maybe you have to travel a lot, that sort of thing. But when they laid me off, then I thought, hey, this is the chance.
And I didn't have to make the hard decision. It would leave it all behind.
Ravi8:11It's interesting because I can see how it could be easier, but also harder. You know, as a coach, I work with many people who are in transitions. And for many of them, their knee-jerk reaction is to, you know, the day after the layoff, maybe take a few days off, but then go and look for the next job. I'm really curious for you. I mean, so you were laid off. You were exposed to Pat Flynn, who's an online entrepreneur, who has a great podcast. I mean, what was it that made you say?
Like, how did you decide that you wanted to go down the path of starting your own business versus take your project management skills to any other tech company that I'm sure, you know, there are lots of jobs out there for people like you? Right. You chose a different path. What was it that made you pursue or, I guess, led you down that alternative route?
Doug9:03So two main things. One, as soon as I found the, you know, smart passive income within, I would say six weeks, I like launched a site and a couple other sites and failed a few times where I learned a lot along the way. You know, I know a lot of people listening to this probably have the same mindset as you and I, Ravi, where it's like, you know, an iterative approach, like learn each time, like get a little better each time. And, you know, for me, I always frame it around project management because it's part of my brand.
So framed around project management. I got started quickly and by the time I got laid off I had a couple like good, like successes where I made, you know, several thousand dollars per month for stretches of time. So I knew that it was possible. And I surrounded myself with a mastermind group of people that were a little bit better than me so always a good move, by the way. So I had those people that were sort of pushing me and I could see that they were, you know, achieving success.
And maybe they didn't have as good of a, you know, a pedigree with their college degree or their career or anything. But they just worked hard and they were interested in what they were working on. So by the time I got laid off, I had two years of some successes and failures under my belt. So I knew it was possible. The other part is I did look for some jobs. And as you mentioned a couple of times, I'm in Bozeman, Montana. So it's sort of a small-ish town.
It's 45,000 people. My wife and I are from the Atlanta area, so it's like several million people there. There's way more jobs. I have a much bigger network there, and I'm sure I could have gotten a position within a couple weeks just through my network. And this much smaller town, there are way fewer jobs, and I was still having trouble finding like a remote position. So I did look a little bit for other positions, interviewed for a couple things, but nothing panned out. And, you know, it's not always easy to find a job, especially when I think I'm in the sort of no man's land or no woman's land where I have about 10 years experience.
I'm a little bit expensive to hire and I want to work on a good team. So I'm kind of fussy in that way. Does that make sense?
Ravi11:33It makes sense. So were, were you in Bozeman before or after the layoff?
Doug11:38I had just moved to Bozeman when I got laid off. Oh, okay.
Ravi11:42Okay. So not only did you get laid off. You were also in a bit of a, not remote. It's not like you're in the wilderness, but, but you're in, you know, a smaller town. So it seems like those were two things that sort of helped you stay down the path of entrepreneurship and not just get sucked back into working for another company in Atlanta. or something like that. Exactly,
Doug12:05right. And, I mean, you know, I know we're going to get to some of the, like, how we actually ended up in Bozeman, but, I mean, you're exactly right. Just things sort of fell into place. It looks like a perfectly orchestrated thing, but it was a, you know, meandering path that we didn't know where it was leading while we were on it or, frankly, even now. Well, let's
Ravi12:28talk about that. I'm intrigued. What led you there? So
Doug12:33I found a position at this software company in the consulting division and very slowly over time, say, you know, six years ago. And you probably saw this too, Ravi, where like clients were having just more of their teams work remotely. So there was less office space. There wasn't a reason for us consultants to be in the office either. and, you know, frankly, that's expensive to, you know, get people to travel around or even have office space and pay for, you know, the seats and everything. So I was slowly working remotely at home from my condo in Atlanta for a year.
So it started with like one day a week and then it grew into like 95% of the time. I was working at home. If I went to the office, no one was there. So it was more just a, you know, if I had to run an errand. in midtown or something, I'd head to the office. So my wife was also a totally different position, different company and stuff like that, but she was an account manager and she had a lot of flexibility with her schedule. So we realized that we could work remotely just on her own.
And I think this is way more common now, but several years ago, people thought we were crazy. our family and friends had no idea how this was going to work out. So our plan was to like rent a house in some city that we wanted to visit and stay for about a month. So of course, that's like the opposite of a lot of, you know, quote, digital nomads or, you know, location independent folks where, you know, they're seeking out a cheaper place in, you know, some other part of the world to, you know, take advantage of the dollar and that sort of thing.
But we went to places like Austin, Denver, we visited family a couple times in like Fort Wayne, Indiana, which is not like a hotbed of, you know, entrepreneurship or anything. But we were visiting family there. So, yeah, basically we realized that we could do this sort of slow travel and really enjoy ourselves. I was, you know, I would take days off and work four day weeks while we were visiting. And it was just great. It was a really, you know, fun time. It's always great to look forward to a trip.
So I'll pause there before I tell you how we got to Montana.
Ravi15:04Yeah, yeah, that's, you know, it really does remind me a bit of the journey that I took as well in, in, after I left my corporate job and, and people who are listening will have already heard a bit about my story, so I don't have to go into it now. But, yeah, we ended up in, you know, we did check out, we didn't make it to Austin, but we did go to Bozeman for a short period of time, ended up moving to Morrison here in Colorado.
But yeah, nice. Interested in hearing more about, you know, what led you then to Bozeman finally.
Doug15:44So, you know, my wife and I lived in the Atlanta area. We actually both went to Georgia Tech. So we were kind of like in that, you know, 30 mile radius for most of our lives. We've traveled some, of course, but we were like, we can move. anywhere we want. Like a lot of big cities, traffic was becoming a little bit of an issue and it's still getting worse and worse. Now, we wanted to check out Montana, but it was a little far away and you know, a little backstory.
We had a dog named Brody who is now passed away. It was very sad but we had a dog and he traveled with us everywhere. So border collie, he's great, Like he was a great traveler. And the thing is, if we were going to come out to Montana, we were going to drive, and from Georgia you know, getting deep into logistics is about a three or four day drive. It's pretty far. And we thought, hey, if we're going to drive that far, we should stay for a while.
So we planned a three month trip out to the Montana area. So we went to whitefish for about a month and then we rented a place down here in Bozeman for about six weeks and, by the way, right before we left we sold our in Atlanta. So we knew we had to find somewhere to live. Now, we thought, actually, we'd be, you know, almost neighbors with you, Ravi down in the Denver area, being a bigger city. We had some friends there. We spent, you know, several months of our lives in the Denver area and really like it.
That's actually when I, the first time I went out west, it was in the, you know, Colorado area and in Rocky Mountain National Park. So I have, like, fond memories of that area. But once we got to Bozeman, we saw that it was like a little bit closer to the mountains. I could see mountains, you know, outside my window right now. And there was way less traffic. So I referenced traffic a couple of times. And I could definitely say there's like a low level of stress when I'm around more traffic.
I see it around like with other people too. Like no one really likes to sit in traffic. Here in Bozeman is small enough to like like the rush hour. It lasts like, you know, 15 minutes or something.
Ravi17:54I was reading, I was, I forget the study. I was looking at one of these studies that look at job satisfaction and dissatisfaction. And the number one point of dissatisfaction for most workers isn't the job, it's the commute.
Doug18:07I believe that, man. I was recently back, I visited, um, you know, some family back in Atlanta for a couple weeks. And, um, I didn't even bring it up. They were telling me about the traffic and like how much it was stressing them out. And sure, I mean, I was late. I mean, I like to be early when I meet people. But, yeah, there was nothing I could do. Like, there's an accident on the interstate. And, you know, traffic is a great theme for people to complain about.
So I'll shut up.
Ravi18:36Well, so you being in Bozeman, do you think that's been a net? I mean, has it been a positive, negative, or neutral thing in terms of helping you start and grow your business?
Doug18:48Good question. I think I'm going to say like roughly neutral. So I am pretty, for whatever reason. Just I'm fine working by myself. Maybe I got used to it, as I was like slowly working from home at my corporate gig for a while, And I think maybe there may be more like entrepreneurs in this area than I realize. I'm trying to do a little better job, networking, going to one million cups and trying to find like my group of people, but of course it's 45000 people, so there's going to be fewer, just by default, even if it's, you know, sort of a tech hub, which I wouldn't necessarily
Ravi19:33call it that and one million cups is a is sort of a techie networking event yeah
Doug19:40you know I've only been to a few of the meetings but there's a lot of local businesses but yeah typically networking and there's a wide like range of people people that show up to those. All
Ravi19:50right. All right. So it's been sort of neutral. And, you know, I'm with you now running my business. And what I've seen is we now have the tools and technology to pretty much do, well, almost anything from anywhere. And while human interaction is important for a lot of our work, we can do it on really do it anywhere, which is sort of cool. Now, I actually want to go a little deeper into what you actually do because there are people listening who are, whether they're in a nine to five or they've got a side business going, they're wondering, hey, how can I, you know, start a blog and make some money off it or just have a residual income stream?
Maybe if you can define what is a niche site and then walk us through a little bit what it's all about and how to actually make money from a website. Okay.
Doug20:40So quick definition The niche website is, you know, really it's just a website that covers a narrow topic and ours is specifically like affiliate marketing is the monetization method. So remember that as we're going through quick. Other note niche site is a branding thing, right. Some other people will call it, you know, an affiliate website. Some people will call it an authority website, but really it's all branding, um, and I mean my website is niche site project, so I stick with a niche site vernacular in general.
So the monetization method is Amazon Associates, right. So it's the Amazon Associates program. That's their affiliate program. And basically, in the simplest terms, I have a website and I'll have a review about a product. Say, I'm just going to say like a cell phone cover, right? So the cell phone case. And I'll have a review about it and I'll have some affiliate links. Hopefully I'm providing some valuable information to the visitor so that they can make a decision on whether that's a good phone case for them in this case.
And And if they click through the link, they go over to Amazon, they make a purchase. I would get a small commission for that purchase and anything else that they purchase in their cart. It's anywhere between like one and I think 10%. And it depends on the product category. Now, right now, when we're recording this, it's sort of in the retail season, November, December, and people, like everyone that I know, is buying many things on Amazon, their shopping carts are much bigger. And this is a time of the year where if you have your site running, you can make four, five, eight times more than you would on average for the other, say, 10 months of the year.
Ravi22:32Okay. So you've got a website. You pick a product, cell phone covers. You provide some content that adds value, maybe your opinion of it, reviews, pros and cons, and then you link to Amazon and you get a bounty based on the click. Based on the purchase. Oh, the shopping cart. Oh, what they buy in the cart. Got it. Do you remember what the first dollar you made was off a niche site? I
Doug22:58do. And it was actually a different monetization method, but it was like AdSense. And as I mentioned, it was probably within two months of me learning about niche sites just because, you know, I get a little obsessed about things and, like, go real, really deep, really fast. So, yeah, it was AdSense. And I remember telling my wife, like, oh, somebody clicked on our little AdSense banner, and we made, like, 34 cents. And within, you know, a week, we, you know, amassed a whole dollar.
Ravi23:33Interesting. Well, let's, people are probably wondering, okay, that's fine. Maybe it can make, you know 10 bucks 100 bucks a month or something but are people actually making reasonable incomes doing this and if you can share any examples either from yourself or from people you've worked with that would be
Doug23:52great sure um that is a common misconception and like i had that thought when i first started and frankly all the success stories that i cover i think i probably would have thought people were making up stories. So basically, yes, you can make a full-time income and a good friend of mine. This is probably like one of the best cases that I've sort of worked with, but it's a friend of mine who was in a mastermind group, and I started coaching him. And he had like the core like skills, but he wasn't good at the process side, which coming with my PM background.
I helped him create processes and templates and he really did well. So I think at this point he's making about 40K a month or so. And he had a, he wasn't a CPA, but he was in the accounting area in a corporate situation. So he was making probably average income. And now obviously he's making multiple six figures a year. He and his wife travel. And yeah, he's doing, doing
Ravi25:04fantastic. And that's profit, not just yeah, mostly
Doug25:07Profit. Yeah, that is actually that's bottom line. So then another good example. So he had sort of a corporate position. But another example I like to give is a musician that I worked with where he basically was like a private music teacher and you know what. I'll describe him as a stoner. He kind of. He kind of looks and acts and talks like a stoner and he's a musician. So you know if it looks like a duck then, but the thing is he was very into the idea of, you know, creating these niche sites and having an amazon site and as a musician and an artist like he wasn't making like great money, just in general.
So at this point, for the last two years he's been making like five to seven thousand dollars a month, which you know more than replace the. You know his full-time income. And I think by a lot of standards, like when we scale things back, when we, you know, when we're in the position that you and I were in, Ravi, like, maybe we have a little savings. We don't, we're not driving like super fancy car. I don't know what kind of car you drive, but, you
Ravi26:20know. Super, Subaru outback. It's, it's very fancy.
Doug26:23That is like the, that's the car around there.
Ravi26:27It's the state car, yeah. That's right.
Doug26:29But the point is, like, $5,000 to $7,000 a month, like most people can make that work, depending on their situation. If you have a big family or something like that, I totally understand. But, yeah, so you can make a full-time income. Well,
Ravi26:44just one point on that. So there's been research done. Humans are just terrible at figuring out what's going to make us happy. And there's been research done actually by Daniel Kahneman, Nobel Prize winning, behavioral economist. economist, and what he discovered was beyond 75K of household income, based on the average household that has 2.4 kids or whatever, or 2.4 family members, after $75,000 of income per year, there's no correlation between more income and more happiness. And so when you say that, whether it's $5,7K a month, you're sort of hitting at that level where I guess the research shows that were diminishing returns to more happiness.
So anyway, I wanted to just highlight that point. Perfect.
Doug27:33And that makes plenty of sense. I mean, when I, we tried to do a little Black Friday shopping, you know, around here, but the decision fatigue and I'm like, I don't need these extra, whatever it is we're looking at. And we actually didn't even buy anything. So where was I? So
Ravi27:53what I want to talk about is. success story. So you have the accountant who's made a good income, you know, 40K a month. And then you probably have several other people who have made either a thousand or 5,000 or let's say 5K. Can you give some examples of, examples of niche sites that are earning a few K a month, let's say 5K a month, that you have heard of or seen or work on the
Doug28:19people on? So this is a tough one. Let me think just for a moment here. And I'll tell you why I'm pausing. So from a professional standpoint of an affiliate marketer, I try not to out anyone's sites.
Ravi28:32Oh, I see. Okay. I guess what I'm looking for is more of the general tone. Sure. I mean, is it like potting soil? Is it like, I mean, you mentioned cell phone covers. You know, does someone just have a site about cars? Or is that not niche? Just to give people a flavor of what actually people are doing.
Doug28:51Okay. I'll give you two extreme cases. And one is a big site that a lot of people probably heard of. It's the wire cutter. Oh, yeah. Okay. And so that, you know, at its core at the beginning, it was a Amazon site. Now they have several other programs that are on there. The site was purchased by New York Times a couple years ago for, I don't think they mentioned how much, but it was like, I think like tens of millions of dollars. I think it was a lot.
But the New York Times bought it from an individual named Brian Lamb who had been in the content space
Ravi29:27for years. He was at your gadget, right?
Doug29:29Oh, that's right. Yeah, that's right. So that is sort of like the best in class. There's several other sites in that sort of like, at that level I guess, where they're huge. They have like professional writers and really well written research content where people are purchasing the products and they're actually testing them out head to head. You know those. Those are super high quality. Now I'll mention um, another like. This is a niche site too, but I was, um, I cook a decent amount, so I was looking up like sourdough recipes, right.
So I don't know if people are familiar with that, but essentially like it's instead of using like storebought yeast to make bread or make pizza crust or something you have like this, the sourdough starter. And san francisco has a you know famous, oh yeah, like sourdough. Um, I guess like a yeast starter. But basically I was reading about like dough and yeast and stuff like that. And I found this site and this guy is totally into I mean, he bakes multiple times a day. He's been writing about this thing that he's super passionate about And I guarantee you he'd be writing that stuff anyway even if he didn't have a site.
But the thing is, as I was reading it I was like, oh like, he's recommending certain products on Amazon that he uses and he shows you how he uses it. And that too is a, you know, niche affiliate website. This, that is very niche, where he's only talking about baking with sourdough, but you know it's super narrow. But he's also, you know, the authority in the space. He probably is going to get a book deal out of it and he's probably making good money through his affiliate links just because he's providing good information, um, and he has an expert level of knowledge where a person couldn't just go and compete with him because he is deep in the sourdough.
Ravi31:31literally deep in sourdough, his hands are in it. It's
Doug31:35crazy, but I mean, I read so much content because it's so in depth and he's just into it. So I went off a little bit there, but yeah, so two extreme examples of those. And
Ravi31:48you mentioned Pat Flynn was someone who inspired you and didn't he create like a security guard training niche site and make that's like he made quite a bit from helping people pass security guard exams
Doug32:04right so in the backstory on this is i think his his mom was retiring from her other job and she was looking to become a security guard somewhere under certain trading and certification, and Pat Flynn several years ago created this site where he covered the qualifications for each state. So it varies by state. And he provided that information. There's a whole component. We haven't gotten into the deep end here talking about keyword research, but people may search on Google for what does it take to be a security guard in Colorado.
And then that is what Pat's site was trying to rank for. So he created this site. It was all based on AdSense, which is like Google's sort of advertising network, and you could sign up as a content provider, and they'll show ads on your site. So Pat would have people visit his site, learn a little bit about becoming a security guard in whatever state, and then there was probably a banner for some training. program that a company was showing ads for it was super relevant they would click on the visitor would click on that ad and then pat would get a little uh money for each click
Ravi33:30Hmm, interesting. So you know, if someone wants to get started and figure out, if this is even, I guess, what are, what are some of the initial steps someone would take, who they've got their day job but they think this might be an interesting thing in the same way you did. You got your start right, um sure, how would they go about it?
Doug33:57So I'll break down, like the very high level, like four steps. So you need to, you know, figure out what niche you want to work in and, like I mentioned the the sourdough bread niche, I mean you can go super narrow and really if there's some products that can be purchased on on Amazon, which is almost endless, then you could probably create a site around it. So first you have to pick your niche, Then you need to sort of figure out what keywords people are looking for.
And that's sort of a different exercise. There are some tools and apps out there that you can use to find what people are actually searching for, which is key. And then once you have a set of keywords that you can work from, again, it would be something like, You know, how do I use sourdough to make pizza crust? Stuff like that. Usually it's like a how-to thing or best iPhone case, something like that. So some are more product-driven and some are more informational driven. There's value in both.
Ravi35:04Should it be something that you're in, I'm assuming you should have some interest in what you're writing about or does it not matter?
Doug35:12It is very helpful if you have some interest because like all things that are worthwhile, it's going to be a little hard at some point. So if you at least have an interest level in it or some background knowledge, that's really helpful to help you push through the times where it gets a little tough. Okay. It's not required. I've definitely started sites that I had very low interested or covered material, covered products that I don't know anything about. And then it's a research exercise versus like, you know, telling a story that you're interested in.
Got it. Okay.
Ravi35:54So you pick a couple of products, maybe browse Amazon, see what's available, look at Google keyword research, see what people are searching for, and Google has tools for that. What are the next couple steps?
Doug36:06So after that, it is publishing content. So, by the way, you can do this on social platforms. So you can put your affiliate links in Facebook or Pinterest or other places that you may be. You can do it on YouTube as well. For me, I'm focused on the written word in blogs. That's the sort of SEO that I know. And, you know, for me, it's a little bit more, I guess, secure where, I don't know. know how big people are into Facebook groups, but there was a time where people would try to build their whole platform on Facebook and then Facebook started charging for ads.
And those people were in big trouble because they didn't have direct contact with their audience without paying for it. So I try to avoid building stuff on other people's platforms, which I don't have control on.
Ravi37:03So then you've got content. So you've got a site, you found a cool domain name. You started a WordPress blog or some kind of site, you've done some reviews, and then you, I mean, what's the, what's the path from zero to a thousand bucks a month? I mean, what does that look like? For someone who's motivated, it's not their full-time job, but it's, you know, five hours a week, 10
Doug37:26hours a week. And I will, I'll backtrack to the final step is promoting your site. So you do need to go out. And, you know, from an SEO standpoint, you're getting backlinked. And, you know, in a more general sense, you're networking with other people that are interested in that topic like the sourdough guy. He would work with, like, food and cooking blogs and, you know, maybe be interviewed on their podcast or on their YouTube channel or write a guest post for their blog. So that sort of thing.
And to recap the four steps. So you find your niche, you find some keywords, you write the content, you promote it. So that's like the four steps.
Ravi38:06So you've actually got to go out and talk to human beings, is what you're so. as part of this promotion. Google's not going to do it for you.
Doug38:13Right. You definitely have to go out there in network. No one cares about you or your site, so you have to tell them about it. Then the path to $1,000. So typically, it's longer than it used to be. So to hit $1,000 in a single month, right, is probably going to be between maybe eight months and a year. Now, there's probably in the first four months, you'll probably make about $100. And then after that, there's a good chance that you'll be able to hit $100 month within like five to six months or so.
And then if you're, you know, if you're graphing this out in your mind, you see that it grows pretty fast, right? Like there's a long period of slow growth. And then something happens about six months in. A lot of times you'll get a lot more traffic. Now, like most things, if you put more time and or money into it, you can't do this much faster. But for average person, average people starting out, the learning curve and working through the process takes a little time.
Ravi39:26Who would this be a good? Because you not only do this yourself, you also coach people who do this. So I'm curious, because I know you've had successes, but you've probably seen people who you just see okay they're not this isn't going to work for them i'm curious who's this going to be a good fit for perhaps and who maybe is not right is this not the best fit for them to go pursue
Doug39:50so i think it ended up being like a self-selecting group of people that i work with um a lot of times it is like IT managers directors and vice presidents that don't like their job and they want to a little more freedom with their time. I think you and I ended up in the same position, maybe not that far along for me. But basically, I was like, this job kind of sucks. I really don't like what I'm doing. The people are nice, but it's sort of the same, you know, work on the release.
There's all the problems with the release. Everything's behind schedule, the budget, and it's all the same thing over and over again. You know, three releases per year, and it was the same thing for like five years. in a row and, you know, the culture was sort of bad. And I find that people with that background can transition easily to, you know, a systems approach, which I adopt for, like, creating the sites and, you know, the coaching and the course that I have, it is sort of shaped around project management and a system implementation style like project.
So it's really easy for people like us to come in and understand like what we're trying to accomplish plus we know that every single project like goes off schedule there's unexpected things that happen that are out of our control and we could just deal with it a little bit better um does that make sense
Ravi41:22Yeah, totally makes sense. So, someone who is a systems thinker, it really to me it seems like a puzzle. It's like how do you get, you know, supply and demand matched up? How do you look at the key google research? How do you, you know, figure out the right outreach to get your networking down? It's really like a giant puzzle, a system. It's like you want to tune an engine. Right, exactly, yeah, okay.
Doug41:47And you know the the other thing that I saw just again with working with people most of the folks ended up being either software developers or project managers, or they did that before they became a director. Yeah, and, like I said, perhaps we're a little bit more patient because you know, we worked for four years on getting one promotion and then we got like an 8% raise. Maybe your raises were higher, Mine weren't that great, So you know we bust our ass. We do volunteer work.
We do all the things that we're supposed to do. And then, you know, great job. 8% raise. By the way, you're getting a bunch of people and your job's getting a lot harder now. So good luck. But, yeah. So tech people. end up doing really well with it because of the way that we're patient, I think. Yeah.
Ravi42:43So I want to talk a little bit more meta level about you and your business, because you've you've now been two years full time on it, right? Yes, Yeah, And then, a little bit before that, you got going, I'd love I mean people I know, before I started my business, I thought, oh, this will be great, I'll quit my job, travel, have all this time, build a business. It'll be awesome. And then reality hit and I'd love to hear from you you know, I guess, what, what have been some of the struggles that you've had to overcome in the past couple years if there have been even one or two that we can talk about.
And then I also want to talk about, um, how you overcame them. So what have you struggled with? And then, how have you overcome those things?
Doug43:27So right when I got laid off I panicked a little bit. I didn't like try, and you know, get any old job like as fast as I could. But I looked at the opportunities that I had. So I had, you know, several different areas of my business. One was sort of service based, One was course based, One was, you know, pure affiliate site and then like some one-on-one coaching. So at least four areas where I was. I saw good opportunities. I saw you know six-figure income to replace my old job and I was like all right, I'm going to work on each one of them as a coach.
Ravi, you probably already see the big problem with that. So I worked on like four areas and kind of like drove myself a little crazy. I was busier than I was, I was more stressed out than I used to be and there's only so many things you could do in the day, like I know that now. However, you know each area maybe was let me think back a couple a couple of the areas were bringing in like four thousand dollars a month and six and maybe seven thousand um, so all together it was working out, but I wasn't very happy.
So that was a that was a big issue. And again, if I, if someone came to me and told me they were working on you know four specific areas of their business, I would tell them to just pick one for like 90 days and it'll change their life. You know, like really simple. So it took me about eight months to realize what I thought was the most promising area was something I didn't want to do. It was a service-based business. And service-based businesses are great for, you know, fast income.
I had, you know, a network of people that were good customers. But, you know, you're trading time for money. If I wanted to scale in any way, I would have. have to build a team and the team that I envisioned was basically the same kind of team that I had in my corporate job. So I would create a job for myself and I'm in the same you know position as I was maybe even a little bit busier and I had all the stress of making sure the pipeline was full.
So we had clients. I realized that was bad, So I stopped doing that. I realized I hated it and I didn't want to do it. So I went like more into the course route and just focusing on, like the affiliate site which gives me, um, I guess, the the experience and I could test things for the course. So they worked together really well, um, just in general, and so I overcame the issue by just realizing that I'll do much better off focusing. There's a couple books, um, the one thing and essentialism.
I'm sure you've read them both right.
Ravi46:22yeah so So Keller, the Keller Williams guy wrote the one thing. And is it Greg McKeown on Essentialism? That's
Doug46:31right. I was hoping you to remember their names because it escapes me. Yeah.
Ravi46:36Now, you've mentioned mastermind twice. And I love, what is a mastermind and what have you gotten out of your mastermind?
Doug46:48Okay, So mastermind in my case it's a group of people usually working on some common set of like activities. So for me, I have a mastermind with people with amazon affiliate sites and then I have another, uh, with course related um ideas, right, and we meet on a regular basis. We work through issues that we have. So if I'm struggling with um, you know course material, I'm not sure how to you know structure, something I can put together a question and ask them for help. And, of course, if you have a couple, you know a couple people with different perspectives that can usually see something that you can.
Oftentimes, we're very blind to our own situation. Even if we're aware that we are blind, like, you can't see it. And you need someone externally to tell you to focus on a certain area. And the other big thing is accountability. So one of my groups, we set like one major goal for, for a two-week period and like we're on the hook. We know we have to come back to the group. And even though we're, you know, we're friends, we're very close, we will hold each other to a high standard as far as the accountability and say, you know, if you didn't accomplish your goal, like what's the deal?
Like what happened? Did you waste your time somewhere else? Are you not serious about this? And really hold each other to a high standard for me. Well, do you have anything to add with mastermind groups? Well,
Ravi48:23I've been part of a few different groups. I, obviously, as a coach, I also work with a coach. It's been life-changing. I've worked with coaches for a long time. I've also been part of several groups. And I just, there's power in hearing other people share, even if it's not your problem. So hearing in a group of eight people, others share their challenge, their solution, what they're working on. It can help trigger something in myself. of how their situation applies to me. So there's something about learning in a group that's really powerful, even if you're just an observer and masterminds are, I think, powerful in a lot of companies that's natural, high-performing teams operate like their own mastermind.
Yep. And so in the corporate world, we know that in education, if you look at the way, for example, MBA programs are structured, they're structured in group projects. You know there's something about the group. It's not just about the individual solving, it's about the group coming together and one plus one equals three. So you know, I I'm a big believer in that and that, you know, at various times people should have a group. You know, even for me, for example, I'm a runner. I go to a local running club once a week.
I try to because I just like being around that environment. We trade our own all tips and training strategies and it's it's not only a to go run but also a chance to troubleshoot with other people. So I, that really resonates with me. So Doug, I just, in our last couple minutes, I'd love to hear, you know, in the past two years, you've learned a lot. And if you can go back to your, your past self from a couple years ago when you were first starting your business and give yourself some advice, knowing what you know now, what would you say?
What would you say? What would you go back and tell Doug of two years ago that would make this entrepreneurial journey or just life
Doug50:27Right. Well, I think it's pretty close to the advice that I would want to hear now or that I need now, so this could be sort of a therapy session. I think it would be, you know, focusing on fewer things. Like, like I mentioned before, one of the big issues I had I was I was working on too many things, and I know if I can focus on one thing for longer, I'll definitely make more progress. It's really hard to do when there are, you know, even still there are too many things that I'm working on.
So if I could tell myself to focus, that would be great. And the other part would be, you know, be patient. Everything's going to be a little bit harder than you think. It's going to take a little bit longer than you think. But you have time and, you know, a couple areas that I've really taken my time on, in a conscious way, is, you know, my course and focusing on, like, creating the best material possible first and then focus on, you know, marketing it in different ways in the future.
So just taking an incremental approach, knowing that I can't do, I can't make everything perfect the first time around, but I can't take my time and work on things in a slow, like methodical way and be patient so
Ravi51:47be patient love it well Doug you know I really appreciate you taking the time time out to chat with us and share your insights in your entrepreneurial journey if people want to connect with you where should they go
Doug52:01Well, it's been an honor, you know, talking with you today, Ravi, so really appreciate that. You could find me at nitchsiteproject com and there are uh, there's a couple ways that you can sign up for the email list, but if you just go to the home page there, if you click on the green button, you can sign up. Um, additionally, I put together sort of a like a starter kit for like niche sites. So if you're interested in what I was talking about as far as niche sites and affiliate marketing, you go to niche site projectcom slash ravi again probably click a green button.
It'll be easy to sign up. But If you give me your email address, I'll send you tons of freebies, including lots of keywords. At that point, I do have some examples of niche sites that I couldn't remember off the top of my head. But there's a lot of material there if you're interested in that sort of affiliate marketing area. I'll send you other emails, but if you don't want to get emails from me, feel free to unsubscribe. Yeah, I have to get it to you.
Ravi53:05Yeah, I mean, you've got to, you know, it's, I think people are good at managing their box or unsubscribing. But you have some really interesting articles, including you have this one, it's like this mega article on, that has tons of case studies of examples of people who have started niche sites and built them up. So I didn't know much about this whole world of Amazon affiliate marketing. So it was eye-opening for me. So I think some people will definitely enjoy that. And who knows, maybe they'll build a side business and have a new full-time job as a results.
So Doug, again, thanks a lot and enjoy the mountains. Thanks, Ravi. Thanks for listening. If you'd like to learn more about niche sites and what Doug Cunnington's up to, visit his website at niche siteproject.com. And of course, I'd always welcome your feedback. feel free to tweet at me using at Yogi Ravi or of course just visit my website Raviraman.com and send me a message. If you feel up for it, feel free to leave a review on iTunes. Your review helps other people find the podcast. And last but not least, if you know anyone else that might enjoy listening, please go ahead and share this podcast with them.
I would be grateful for that. And until next time, have a great day.
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